


Full of Surprises

by PreludeInZ



Category: Team Fortress 2
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-28
Updated: 2015-04-28
Packaged: 2018-03-26 06:01:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3839761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PreludeInZ/pseuds/PreludeInZ
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Originally for my friend valoscope over on tumblr <3</p><p>http://1fort-2fort-redfort-blufort.tumblr.com/post/109451677205/saw-yer-tags-val-writin-you-a-thing-val</p>
            </blockquote>





	Full of Surprises

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Valoscope](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Valoscope/gifts).



Miss Pauling was sorting through some old paperwork, and Scout was hanging around. He’d mentioned something about catching a ride into town with Engie, he was just waiting while his teammate packed up. In and of itself this was not unusual, Scout tended to find some excuse to hang around while she had paperwork to do, and strictly speaking she didn’t mind. Usually it helped pass the time, usually his endless chatter about whatever he’d done for the team that day was entertaining, if obviously exaggerated. But today there seemed to be something different, because it had been at least twenty minutes, and he hadn’t said anything.

“Is everything okay?” she asked, finally, as she shuffled the last of her papers together. “You haven’t said a word, and usually I’ve had to tell you to shut up at least twice by now. Is there something wrong?”

Scout looked up and looked like he’d been caught at something. “Uh. Oh! Uh, well. No. No, nothin’ wrong, not as such. Just, I had a question an’ I been tryin’ to work out how I wanna put it.”

“A question.”

“Yeah. For you. Um, I maybe shouldn’t ask it at all, probably. S'personal, I guess, an’ I got the real bad feelin’ the team’s just screwin’ with me, ‘cuz they do, sometimes.” He shrugged, looked uncharacteristically sheepish.

Miss Pauling smiled, stood up behind her desk, gathering up her files and folders. “Well, now you  _have_ to ask.”

They were in the office and she had just finished up for the day. Scout had been lingering near the door and now he retreated through it, shouldering his bag and hung one hand on the frame of it. “Heh. Uh. No, y'know, never mind. I am like 90% sure they’re tryin’ to get me in trouble. I’ll, um, I’ll see you later, Miss Pauling. Have a good weekend.”

Well, that was interesting, and now she was curious. She followed him to the door, “Wait. Look, I won’t get mad. All right? Promise. And you won’t get in trouble.” Miss Pauling shifted the files she carried and elbowed him in the arm. “Come on, it’s not nice to tease.”

“Aw, I didn’t mean to–”

“What’s the question?”

“Spy said you have a tattoo.” Scout didn’t wait for her to get a word in, and Miss Pauling had to keep herself from laughing out loud, because she would have sworn he was blushing slightly. He usually was at least a little sunburned though, so it was hard to tell for sure. Still. “An’ I’m pretty sure that’s a lie, an’ he’s just tryin’ to trick me into askin’ you so I’d make an ass outta myself, 'cuz obviously it don’t seem like your kinda thing an’ anyway it is  _none_  of my business, an’ forget I asked, okay? 'Cuz I didn’t, actually. Anyway, you  _made_  me.”

Miss Pauling frowned. “I’ve never told anyone that I have a tattoo. I don’t know where in the world Spy would get that idea.”

“ _Right_ , see, an’ I know 'bout how they are all a buncha bastards an’ they do this kinda crap 'cuz…well, I dunno why, y'know how it is, we mess with each other, right. Anyway, never mind. Not your deal, anyway, they’re banned back home. You’re from the east coast somewhere too, right?”

“They bug you about that kind of thing? About me?”

Scout blinked at her and was  _definitely_ blushing now, which thrilled a secret little unprofessional part of her that  _definitely_ was uninterested in any kind of inappropriate relationship with Mann Co. employees. “Crap, nah, don’t listen to me. I, um, I gotta go anyway, okay, I think Engie’s callin’ an’ he will  _not_ wait if I ain’t out in five minutes.”

“I don’t hear anything." There was a slow, unfamiliar smile creeping across her features now. "Hey, come back in a second. Shut the door.”

He did, but looked apprehensive. “Aw, man, look, I’m sorry. I wasn’t tryin’ t'be nosy, just…look, I’ll tell 'em all to knock it off, it’s goddamn rude, spreadin’ rumors about you, just tryin’ to get at  _me_. Lies an’ slander. That’s just real awful of 'em, y'know, I ain’t ever thought about it that way. Buncha assholes.”

Miss Pauling held out the files she was bringing out to her truck. “Hold these.” Deliberately, she untucked the hem of her shirt, undid the bottom few buttons. “I’ve never  _told_  anyone that I have a tattoo,” she repeated, “So this is a  _secret_ , all right? Because we’re friends and I’m annoyed that Spy would make something like that up. Do they really get on your case about me? Jesus. It wasn’t a lie, but it  _was_ a lucky guess. Do you remember, about a year ago I had my appendix out?”

Scout had gone very still, because she’d twisted, undid the zipper at the side of her skirt. “Uh…y-yeah. No, uh, yeah. Scared the crap outta everybody, all the way out here. It’s at least an hour to the hospital in Teufort, was lucky Medic was around. Shoot, you could’ve died.”

Miss Pauling nodded gravely, and held her hand very deliberately on the waistband of her skirt. “Don’t tell anyone? I’m not technically allowed to have one, but the scar was just so ugly, and…well. I don’t know, I always liked the idea of them. So promise you won’t tell?”

“Yeah, sure. Yes, I mean. Yeah, no, I definitely won’t. I won’t tell anybody. Uh…so, but wait, you mean…”

She’d already gently pulled aside the waistband of her skirt, revealing her hipbone and a small delicate sparrow, one wing torn and broken, tiny talons wrapped around a slender, angled scar. This was greeted with stunned silence and staring for the full half a minute that she had it uncovered. Then she zipped her skirt back up, primly hiding the tattoo and the only very slightly lacy waistband of her underwear (oh, had that been visible? What a careless accident.) away. She shrugged, demure, as she gathered her files back into her arms. “It was just something I did. You know, sort of a rite of passage.”

“Mmhmm.” He hadn’t quite stopped staring at the place where she’d bared her skin, and, rather wickedly, Miss Pauling didn’t mind in the least. 

Gently, though, she did add, “It isn’t allowed, though. I shouldn’t have gotten it and I’d get in trouble. So don’t tell, okay?”

Outside, Engie laid on the horn and Scout snapped back into the present. He grinned at her. “Shoot. I gotta go, he’ll leave without me, but I…hey, don’t worry. I mean it, I won’t tell anyone. S'cool, though, Miss Pauling. I wouldn’t have expected it about you.”

Miss Pauling debated with herself about holding him up a little longer, letting Engie leave, offering him a ride wherever he was going. But she had files to burn, and it would be thoroughly unprofessional, and completely out of left field. She decided that she’d done more than enough damage for the day, and instead just smiled again, winked. “Well, I’m full of surprises.”

* * *

 

Engie arched an eyebrow when Scout tossed his bag into the bed of the truck and clambered into the cab, grinning like an idiot. “Son, you look like the cat that ate the canary, what the hell’s got into you?”

“Nothin’,” Scout answered in the sort of voice that indicated he meant precisely the opposite, still beaming as he put his feet up on the dash and reached over to mess with the radio. “What, me? Not a goddamn thing.”


End file.
